Lower-level management employees at American Airlines Inc. will be in line for profit sharing beginning this year, assuming American makes a 2013 profit. And for those who lose their jobs, there’ll be at least six months’ severance pay.

In a letter Thursday to management employees, senior vice president of people Denise Lynn said the company will distribute 10 percent of any pretax profits to employees through profit-sharing.

In an example included in the letter, if American had a pretax profit margin of 2 percent in 2013, an employee would get profit-sharing equal to about 2.6 percent of his or her base pay. For an employee earning $50,000 a year, that would represent a check of $1,300.

“I know it’s been a long time since we last made profit-sharing payments. This year, with most of our restructuring efforts in place, if we all do our part to run a great airline for our customers, we are hopeful 2013 can be a profitable year,” Lynn wrote in the letter, made public Friday.

“And, unlike our old profit-sharing plan that didn’t pay unless we earned at least $500 million, our new profit-sharing plan will pay as long as we earn a profit in 2013,” she said.

She also informed the employees that they’ll get at least a half year’s pay if they lose their jobs within two years of the merger.

“We recognize there is some level of uncertainty involved in any merger, yet we want you to be able to focus on the job at hand with some degree of financial security. Therefore, we also have enhanced our severance policy for management to provide a minimum of six months’ severance pay, regardless of your company seniority,” Lynn wrote.

She noted that the profit-sharing plan and the severance policy are contingent on the merger being completed and American’s bankruptcy plan of reorganization being approved and implemented.

The profit-sharing will go only to nonunion employees. When American Airlines executives outlined cuts in labor costs Feb. 1, 2012, they proposed paying out 15 percent of pretax profits as profit-sharing. However, American’s unions chose to take wage increases in lieu of the possibility of profit-sharing.

The payout was reduced to 10 percent of pretax profits to align American’s plan with merger partner US Airways Inc.